Like most schools that were shuttered by the COVID-19 virus, North Florida School of Special Education in Jacksonville had to sprint to set up a distance learning program for students suddenly confined to their homes.

For Sally Hazelip, the head of NFSSE, it was a longer race that taught her how to navigate unfamiliar education territory.

“I just ran a marathon in October, and your mental strength in a marathon is almost as important as your physical strength, she said. “That’s what this is like now: Just put one foot in front of the other and push through it.”

While adapting on the fly to the virtual classroom has been disruptive to educators, students and parents in public and private schools, the transition has been particularly challenging to NFSSE. It has 250 students with intellectual and developmental differences, such as Down syndrome, autism, fetal alcohol syndrome, and traumatic brain injury. Most are between the ages of 6 and 22 (including 26 students on the Gardiner Scholarship, which is administered by Step Up For Students, the host of this blog), while 65 post-graduates ages 22 and up receive vocational training in micro-enterprises.

Switching them to online lessons overnight yanked everyone out of their comfort zones.

“The fear of the unknown can sometimes be daunting,” Hazelip said, “but my staff has risen to the occasion in so many unique ways.”

Parents also wondered how they would handle the additional responsibilities.

For Linda Horn, whose son Colin, 18, has Down syndrome, the change forced her to recall her days homeschooling her child when the family lived in Seattle.

“I had to personally change my mindset – I had to accept it,” Horn said. “I had to be a better mother and teacher for Colin. I had to be the adult in room. I needed to show Colin everything was calm and routine.”

Cathy Roberts suddenly had three children learning at home: Christian, 17, who has Down syndrome and attends NFSSE; a 16-year-old son with ADHD who attends another private school for students with learning differences; and a 17-year-old daughter who is typical and attends a Catholic school.

“Structure for our kids is key,” Roberts said. “I had to sit down with Christian and explain the virus to him. Initially he was upset. He wanted to go to school. I put up a calendar so he can go to it every day and see his schedule. I have had to become more structured. It’s been a change for all of us.”

Thankfully, several online curricula – Unique Learning Learning System, i-Ready, TouchMath – already were being employed on Smartboards in NFSSE classrooms, so teachers and students were familiar with them. That helped facilitate the academic side of the equation.

What sets NFSSE apart from other schools, though, is what happens outside the classroom.

The school offers several unique hands-on learning opportunities that stimulate intellectual and emotional development and prepare students for independent living. These include Berry Good Farms, an urban organic farm that grows fruits, vegetables and herbs; a culinary arts program where students prepare what the farm grows; therapeutic and recreational horseback riding; and cross-fit training. The school operates a food truck that goes out regularly into the community. Its Barkin’ Biscuits program uses fresh ingredients from the farm to make dog biscuits sold on the retail market.

NFSSE also has reverse-inclusion clubs in which typical students from outside the school participate in extracurricular activities and vocational training programs. And in January, the school opened its crown jewel, a $10 million state-of-the-art campus expansion whose amenities include a fine-arts center, individual rooms for sensory, physical, speech and occupational therapies, and a physical education complex with a gym and locker rooms.

“Academics are incredibly important,” Hazelip said, “but those hands-on activities take them to a different place and keep them engaged.”

Now those activities are on hold, awaiting the all-clear signal to return on the public health front. With it goes a huge part of what makes NFSSE special – elements that are difficult, if not impossible, to replicate remotely.

It’s like limiting Superman to one superpower. The school and its families have been up to the challenge, though.

“I think families with kids with special needs are really resilient,” said Hazelip, whose son Collin, 25, has Down syndrome and is a graduate of NFSSE. “There are so many unknowns. You don’t ever feel like you have all the answers. Part of it is just taking things one day at a time, and to look for creative ways of connecting with your child.”

From the start, teachers have been in close contact with parents and students every step of the way. The school has supplied laptops to families who lacked them. They are using Zoom to conduct live, interactive lessons in core subjects. Students submit assignments at their own pace.

“Zoom has been a godsend,” Roberts said.

Resource teachers use Facebook Live and the school’s private YouTube channel to hold daily art, music, PE, gardening and yoga classes, as well as story time. Berry Good Farms teachers post video cooking classes for students to follow. The equine teacher shot a video showing how she feeds the horses.

On April 3, the school even held its monthly scheduled student and faculty assembly, only this one was recorded in advance and posted online. It included special guest Josh Lambo, place-kicker for the NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars, who read the Dr. Seuss book “Oh, the Places You’ll Go!” Over 150 people watched it live.

Virtual learning is not the same as being out in the greenhouse or the stables, but it maintains the connection between teacher and student, and keeps the kids on a routine that for many is vital to their intellectual and emotional development.

“North Florida prepared [Christian] well for this,” Roberts said. “They already do a lot of work on computers, that part was easy for him. He has such a tight-knit bond with his teachers, being able to see them every day has made a difference.”

Linda Horn has tried to fill the additional time at home with Colin with life skills as he prepares to enter the school’s transition program next year.

“Independent living skills are important,” she said. “So we work on doing the laundry, cooking skills, getting lunch ready and working on dinner.”

She and her son also try to get out in the community as much as possible in the era of the coronavirus.

“I make it a point to stop and say, ‘Look at the plants here’,” she said. “I really try to incorporate what he’s learned. We’re going to go to Lowe’s and buy a tree and plant on Earth Day.”

Hazelip says this unplanned journey into distance learning can be characterized by two words: “resiliency” and “connection.”

“The biggest positive out of this ordeal is we’re one big family,” she said. “That support has given them strength to get through this.”

Andrew Rotherham recently proposed that America’s public schools remain open this summer. Many impediments stand in the way of this, including numerous laws and many thousands of contracts. A common reaction to Rotherham’s summer school proposal looks something close to “that’s not going to happen.”

This was a common reaction to lost instruction time during the 2018 teacher strikes as well.

One group of students – early elementary school children struggling to read – will face serious long-term detriments to chalking the 2020 pandemic up to an act of God. These kids may or may not need and may not be able to get summer school, but they certainly need solutions. These students have a literacy acquisition window, and some of them aren’t going to have their needs met otherwise.

The Big Picture

The United States has an active market in education enrichment, and well-to-do American families have been spending more and more on it.

It’s a safe bet that many students learn to read at home, but others are much more dependent on school to equip them with academic knowledge and skills. Students in advantaged households are likely to fare better during the current closures as well, due to greater access to a variety of resources.

Why It Matters

Learning to read is similar neurologically to learning a foreign language. The reason, for instance, that Arnold Schwarzenegger still speaks English with a heavy Austrian accent despite having lived in the United States for many decades is because he learned English relatively late in life. He could have become a more fluent English speaker, but only with a much greater effort compared to what would have been required if he had learned when he was younger.

If students fail to learn to read in the early grades, they often struggle as grade-level material advances. Such students will describe themselves as “bored,” but “discouraged” might be a better description. They tend to start dropping out of school in large numbers starting in eighth grade. You can test the literacy skills of state prisoners and the news is grim there as well. Literacy becomes much more difficult after age 10.

What to Do?

If summer school for all is either undesired or undoable, strong action is nevertheless called for among young students struggling with reading. Florida already had established a modestly funded ($500) education scholarship account for struggling readers. This program could be expanded to help facilitate the creation of summer reading camps if the pandemic persists.

Local education agencies might create summer schools focused on struggling readers. Perhaps Florida Virtual School could help such students. The clock is ticking for these students, and in early literacy, neglect is malign rather than benign.

Dayspring Academy secondary school principal Tim Greenier and assistant principal Jennifer Smith address students in a virtual morning assembly, encouraging them to continue focusing on academics in their online environment.

Editor’s note: Scroll to the end of this post to watch a portion of Dayspring Academy’s virtual morning assembly, in which assistant principal Jennifer Smith encourages students to “finish this year strong.”

PORT RICHEY, Fla. – The new, online, morning assembly at Dayspring Academy began one day last week with a montage of smiling teachers, set to theme music from “Saturday Night Live.” The secondary school principal and assistant principal kept it laid-back, with their ball caps and coffee mugs. But a few minutes in, they had a serious message for 350 middle and high school students watching on screens at home.

“School” is different now, but it’s still school. Course work needs to be done. Tests are coming up. We need to finish the year strong.

“You need to have this education to be prepared for next year,” he continued. “If we were to just stop now, none of you would be ready for next year. And it would create a challenge. We’re just not prepared to do that.”

Across America, schools are scrambling to figure out what’s doable and appropriate as tens of millions of students switch at a snap to distance learning. Many have decided to go light on academics.

But not all of them.

Dayspring is a PreK-12 charter school with 935 students, 50 miles north of Tampa. When the closures happened, it already had a good bit of digital tech in its tool belt. It quickly filled gaps with devices and connections, then sought to construct an online environment that could approximate the style of learning, built around the Core Knowledge curriculum, that existed on its four brick-and-mortar campuses.

The result: Class is still in session. Dayspring elementary students alone have four, 30-minute core classes every morning, using Schoology and Google Classroom platforms with teachers and classmates. After lunch, they do about two hours of art, dance and other electives. Time for group projects is worked in. So is one-on-one time with teachers. From 3 to 4 p.m., most of them cluster for school clubs, from Legos to ukuleles.

Dayspring students are still being graded and tested. They will still have final exams and report cards. And if attendance is an indicator of engagement, the school is locked in. It averaged 35-45 absences a day before the crisis. It’s averaging six a day now.

“We don’t expect to skip a beat,” said John Legg, a former state senator who co-founded Dayspring 20 years ago with his wife, Suzanne Legg. “We think we’re going to use muscles we haven’t used before and strengthen them. We’re going to be sore. But it’s because we’re developing new muscles.”

On the flip side, there are districts pushing hard (like this one), and charter schools and other schools of choice doing likewise (like these, these, and these). In Rhode Island, Gov. Gina Raimondo told students: “This isn’t vacation. This isn’t time to chill out at home. This is school. Work as hard and as serious as you would as if you were in real school.”

In the 16 years Dayspring has been graded by the state, it’s earned 15 A’s. Forty-eight percent of its students are low-income; 27 percent are students of color. That’s compared to 56 percent and 39 percent for the district it resides in.

Legg is a rare bird. A former chairman of the Senate Education Committee, he was regarded by members of both parties as knowledgeable, thoughtful, even-keeled. He recently earned his doctorate in education, with his dissertation on early college high schools. (Legg is also a member of the board of directors for Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.)

It doesn’t seem right to hold up any school as a model right now. The challenges are so huge and varied. Nobody has all the answers. But it also doesn’t make sense to ignore schools, like Dayspring, that continue to aim for learning gains.

In Ms. Speer’s third-grade class this week, 25 students dove into colonial America. Ms. Speer had them post their questions about colonists into a program called Nearpod. Within a minute, what looked like Post-it notes mushroomed across the screen. How did the Pilgrims survive on the Mayflower? Why were they only in North America and not any other country? Did people celebrate any holidays such as Christmas, Halloween, Easter, or even their birthdays?

“Guys,” Ms. Speer said through the screen, “your questions are amazing.”

In Ms. Manczak’s class, 20 fourth-graders learned soil types, contrasted physical and chemical weathering, and were reminded “humous” isn’t “hummus.” Ms. Manczak put on a master class in multi-tasking. She deftly called on students, fed them bite-sized bits of knowledge and navigated a new learning platform without breaking a sweat. Some of her students were still adjusting to mics and mutes and chat functions, but disruptions were minimal.

In sixth-grade history, Mr. Marecki used a unit on the Industrial Revolution as fodder for debate about whether teachers, lawyers, military officers or the CEO of Apple should make the most money. One student argued for military officers: they’re willing to give up their lives to protect others. True, said another, but teachers trained them for success. Ah, but “anybody can grow up to be a teacher,” said a third. “Only certain people can, like, become a CEO.”

Mr. Marecki smiled without raising an eyebrow.

Dayspring is making changes as teachers learn what works and what doesn’t. There’s consensus the middle school classes should be longer than 30 minutes. There’s worry the more advanced students aren’t being challenged. There’s a desire to provide more social engagement, but a realization they just don’t know how yet.

“We’re building this plane as we’re flying it,” Legg said.

Not easy for any school right now. But at Dayspring, sitting on the runway wasn’t an option.

LiFT Academy student Raina Phenicie, 16, participates in a virtual physical education class from the kitchen in her Pinellas County home.

On the first day of virtual school, Raina Phenicie attended all her classes, including P.E.

“It just blew my mind,” said her dad, Scott Phenicie. “Here’s a kid in my kitchen doing jumping jacks and pushups. She was sweating and breathing and drinking water.”

When music time came, she was banging on pots and pans.

Raina, 16, was born with Velocardialfacial syndrome, a genetic condition characterized by a varying combination of medical issues. Among them are palatal differences, heart defects, difficulty fighting infection and low calcium levels. The condition often involves learning challenges.

Like many of her classmates with neurodiversities, Raina sometimes gets distracted. But Raina’s school, LiFT Academy in Seminole, specializes in celebrating unique abilities. So, when the coronavirus pandemic forced schools to move online, it was business as usual for LiFT Academy teachers.

“We’re masters of accommodation,” said Kim Kuruzovich, executive director of the K-12 nonprofit private school that normally operates on two tree-lined church campuses about 25 miles west of Tampa. Ninety-six percent of the school’s 140 students attend on private school scholarships. Of those, 48 participate in the Gardiner Scholarship Program for students with unique abilities. Two receive a Florida Tax Credit Scholarship. (Both scholarships programs are administered by Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.)

Beyond 12th grade, the school offers LiFT University Transition Program, a four-year post-secondary opportunity for students to develop skills necessary for independent living.

Kuruzovich, a co-founder of LiFT Academy and the mother of a daughter with learning differences, says the key to academic success is the same whether students attend school onsite or online.

“It’s about knowing each student well and providing accommodations so that education works for them,” she said.

Those accommodations could include allowing a child to stand in front of his or her workstation or sit on a balance ball to do schoolwork. Or it could mean building in more frequent breaks, especially for younger students, or encouraging a child to do pushups against the wall if he or she needs to release energy.

But even in the best-managed classrooms, behavior issues can crop up. Add the stress of an all-virtual classroom, and those challenges could escalate.

Raina’s father, Scott, built a makeshift tent around her workstation to help keep distractions to a minimum.

At LiFT, which stands for Learning Independence For Tomorrow, teachers have been successfully managing their virtual classrooms in recent weeks by employing a few strategies. Administrators have all-access passes to Zoom classes to help deal with any academic or behavior issue that may arise. Kuruzovich keeps the door to her virtual office open all day in case a teacher needs a consultation.

Students are muted in live classes unless they have a question. Teachers enable the chat button only during the last five minutes of class. The opportunity to socialize is a reward for staying focused.

“Classroom management is a big focus at LiFT, as our student base is very unique, and so at times it can be tough during a regular day,” said music teacher Damien Ward. “So, when students are home with their siblings around, TV, cell phones, etcetera, it can be hard to keep their full attention during a class period.”

To maintain order, Ward has banned eating during class. He mutes all students while he’s speaking. He’s lightened some workloads and extended deadlines.

“Instead of work having to be finished in class, I have allowed a few students to simply make sure it is emailed to me by the next class period, as I know we have students who struggle with technology or who will panic under the pressure of completing work immediately,” Ward said. “Thus far, it has been working out just fine.”

He’s also become a fan of screen sharing.

“I can set my students a task and if I feel that they aren’t concentrating fully or if they feel that they have something to share with me or the class, they can share their computer screen with me and can show me instantly,” he said.

English teacher Meghan Flores has a group of “very active boys” in one class who often need help staying on track. Besides setting aside office hours when students can virtually visit with her if they have questions or need clarification on assignments, she’s made it a point to get them moving during the school day.

“When I need to make accommodations, it is really simple to allow students to stand and stretch just outside of camera view so they are not a distraction to other students,” she said.

Guidance from experienced online educators indicates LiFT is on the right track with its classroom management strategy. Florida Virtual School, the nation’s largest online education platform, recommends that schools provide an accessible code of conduct and that they remind parents and students of expectations, maintain communication, make lessons engaging and fun, and be familiar with virtual classroom tools that can be used to prevent or correct discipline problems.

Phenicie is pleased that LiFT has made his daughter’s transition to online learning seamless.

“She’s more focused right now,” said Phenicie, who built a makeshift tent around Raina’s kitchen workstation to minimize background views. “In class, little things distract her. But now, she’s got this computer screen to focus on. We watch her from a distance, and we’re seeing independence.”

Something Phenicie hopes LiFT and other schools will continue to keep front and center when they return to brick-and-mortar settings.

Berta DellaSalla, a seventh-grader at Bishop Larkin Catholic School, works on assignments online as her father, Gene, recovers slowly from coronavirus.

As schools continue to navigate their new reality in the face of coronavirus, a Catholic school in Port Richey is facing a challenge that goes beyond educating children and cuts to the heart of what it means to be a community.

On March 10, nearly a week before most brick-and-mortar schools closed, a parent at Bishop Larkin Catholic School tested positive for Covid-19. Administrators made the decision to shut the school down overnight, necessitating an immediate switch from in-person to online instruction.

“It was not a very difficult decision,” said principal Stacy Cervone. “Our priority was the safety of our students, staff and families, and finding the best way to keep everyone safe.”

Bishop Larkin Catholic School, accredited by the Florida Catholic Conference and a member of the National Catholic Education Association, serves 217 students in prekindergarten through eighth grade. Eighty-one students attend on a Florida Tax Credit Scholarship and two attend on a Gardiner Scholarship for students with unique abilities. (Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog, administers both scholarship programs.)

After receiving guidance from the Diocese of St. Petersburg, teachers began using an online platform called Educator Pages to post assignments. Students sign in each morning, then get started on four main assignments, which must be completed daily, covering core subjects like math and science that are presented as a live lesson, a recorded lesson or an interactive PowerPoint.

Students also engage in personal live learning time and choose one elective or resource class assignment to round out their day.

Cervone, a 22-year veteran educator who served as an assistant principal for Hillsborough County Public Schools before coming to Bishop Larkin a year ago, knew that her school needed to go above and beyond caring for students’ safety and educational needs. She considered it part of the school’s mission – working in partnership with parents and parish communities in a spirit of compassion, service and leadership – to aid the family directly affected by the virus.

Gene DellaSala, whose daughter, Berta, is a Bishop Larkin seventh grader, thought he was coming down with a cold in late February following a visit from a business associate who had recently traveled to China. In early March, Gene, 46, learned that his associate had tested positive for Covid-19.

Gene’s doctor diagnosed him with a cold and sinus infection, but his symptoms – a bad cough, stomach cramps and chills – worsened. His wife, Bertha, contacted the Pasco County Department of Health on March 9, and his doctor arranged for him to be tested for coronavirus. The next day, test results confirmed that Gene was the first person in Pasco County to contract the virus.

Bertha knew she had to contact Cervone.

“I felt terrible knowing that BLCS had to be shut down since our kids love it and appreciate the one-on-one relationships they have with everyone,” Bertha said. “But, on the other hand, we were relieved that no one else was going to be exposed to the virus and that they took the precautions to make sure (the school) was safe for everyone.”

For the past three weeks, Bishop Larkin parents and staff have been bringing the family take-out restaurant meals. They’ve picked up medications from the pharmacy. They call and text every day to check in. One parent offered to stop by the school to pick up books for Berta and deliver them to the house.

Bertha said the school’s support has been invaluable as Gene remains quarantined on one side of the house. She doesn’t drive, so help with grocery delivery has been a huge help. An online replication of school spirit days has been a morale booster.

But most of all, Bertha said, she’s appreciative her daughter has been able to continue learning. The educational continuity, in a virtual format, is helping Berta deal with her father’s illness and cope with the fact that she can’t be near him.

“She thrives on a routine, so it’s been hard to keep her motivated and engaged,” Bertha said, adding that the school counselor has called several times to make sure Berta is okay.

Meanwhile, Gene is recovering slowly but continues to test positive for coronavirus. Until he tests negative on two consecutive visits to the health department’s parking lot, where he is swabbed by a technician, he must remain in quarantine.

The school community has pledged to stand by the family for the duration.

Families will remember March 2020 for how quickly state officials closed schools due to the coronavirus outbreak. If schools want to offer parents and children continuity and stability, educators and policymakers must focus in April on jump-starting instruction while students are at home.

“Some teachers who, as soon as this thing hit, they were good teachers and were already connected with their classes,” Hardy says. “They didn’t have to wait for somebody downtown to tell them to do that.”

Hardy continued: “What happened, though, was that the [Philadelphia] school district stopped them from doing this.”

Hardy, who also serves as school board chair for Ad Prima Charter School, said his school is not waiting for the state to issue instructions; the school plans to distribute laptop computers to students without devices at home.

“When you look at how people have responded, it’s my opinion that the charter schools are really out front in this, right away,” Hardy said.

As adults scramble to help children adapt to changes brought on by the virus, our K-12 students do not need perfection. But they do need parents and teachers alike to try.

In Maryvale, Ariz., west of Phoenix, teachers at Western School of Science and Technology (WSST) made sure students could use school devices at home while schools are closed. Eighty percent of WSST students speak a language other than English in their homes, and 95 percent qualify for free or reduced-priced meals, said school director Peter Boyle.

Prior to the pandemic, WSST students divided their time between online instruction and interactions with their teachers.

“We have a significantly high degree of technology penetration and familiarity that allows for a pretty quick switch to this remote learning plan,” Boyle said.

His teachers developed a system of academic playlists, where students access instruction in small bits – 1- to 2-minute segments in some cases.

“A playlist is a personalized learning plan,” Boyle said. “Each teacher populates a playlist, which has about 200 minutes of content, from the online learning programs or from reading materials that we can push out to students.”

Students can choose the order in which they complete the work. Additionally, the school is building on its existing routine of part-time virtual instruction now that all instruction must be online.

In South Carolina, the Charter Institute at Erskine is encouraging all schools to take a similar approach and learn from existing full-time virtual schools. The school is building a library of web videos using the virtual schools to help brick-and-mortar teachers adjust, said Vamshi Rudrapati, director of the Institute.

Julie Phillips, 2019 Charter Institute teacher of the year, who is a virtual school teacher, said in an interview that the best solution, even for teachers who are not experienced with online instruction, is to help students continue “to master and build existing skills.”

“Look at it week by week,” Phillips said. “Every subject that we want them to work on for Monday, use it as a checklist. Check it off, then go to the next subject.”

Many teachers, especially in charter schools, are trying to reach students during the virus, and state officials should encourage these efforts. The pandemic forced physical separation on family, work, and school communities, but it shouldn’t separate teachers and students from ingenuity.

The coronavirus pandemic has educators scrambling to develop impromptu distance learning. We can safely predict the results will be uneven. Many educators are heroically struggling to expand access for students without home internet access. The Center for Reinventing Public Education, however, reviewed the efforts of 82 school districts educating more than 9 million students and found over half either were providing no online learning or simply were sharing links to publicly available websites.

Not surprisingly, many parents turned to educators with more experience with distance learning. This, however, is where that pesky politics and turf business got in the way again. The Wall Street Journal took the state of Oregon to task for restricting access to the state’s online schools, leaving 1,600 students stranded on the waitlist for a single cyber-school. But it could have been worse:

“The state Department of Education originally contemplated closing down virtual public charters along with the brick-and-mortar schools, according to a March 24 PowerPoint presentation reviewed by the newspaper Willamette Week. Even during a national crisis, unions would rather deprive students of an education than see their charter-school competitors succeed.”

Pennsylvania lawmakers also cut off access for additional students to attend online schools. Meanwhile, Florida Virtual School, the sunshine state’s largest online K-12 school, is seeking $4.3 million in technology upgrades that will boost its capacity from its current 170,000 students in district, charter and private schools to 470,000 students by April 17 – eventually expanding to 2.7 million students by May 4. That’s approximately the size of the Florida public school system’s total enrollment. Florida Virtual will offer up 100 courses.

So here is the part where this discussion goes Igor. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease official, expects a second COVID-19 surge in the fall. I know none of you wanted to read that last sentence, but the reality is that the current school shutdown may not be the last school shutdown.

Lots of things can change for the better between now and the fall – testing, treatments and vaccines, for example. Florida policymakers are wise, nevertheless, to expand the state’s capacity to deliver online instruction. Lawmakers in other states might want to stop worrying less about where students enroll and more about whether they have the opportunity to learn.

Pace Brantley head coach Evan Starcher leads his students in a virtual version of jumping jacks to keep them moving during the school day.

When teachers at a central Florida private school that strives to celebrate the uniqueness of each student learned they had only a few days to transition to remote learning, they vowed to get creative.

Really creative.

A math teacher devised a lesson plan using groceries from her pantry to show her students the difference between a polyhedral and a non-polyhedral. A physical education teacher designed a jumping jacks routine. A science teacher began mapping out a virtual tour of her farm.

Meanwhile, a social studies teacher laid out all the steps he takes to check the oil in his family’s Honda Accord.

While many schools throughout the state and the nation are recording lessons for students to access on demand, Pace Brantley School in Longwood is delivering online learning as if it’s a regular school day – and doing it with a healthy dose of imagination. The media team compiled a video to show the myriad ways teachers have come together to serve their students while staying within the bounds of social distancing.

“The kids are seeing their academic teachers as if they were still here on a block schedule,” said head of school Pam Tapley. “We take attendance. Two guidance counselors are monitoring. We just have a lot of great people supporting the classroom.”

Founded in 1972 with 10 students and two teachers, Pace Brantley specializes in educating students from kindergarten through high school with special needs, including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, autism spectrum disorder and other challenges that affect learning. The school serves 165 students, 47 of whom participate in the Gardiner Scholarship program for children with unique abilities. One student attends on a Florida Tax Credit Scholarship, which along with the Gardiner program is administered by Step Up For Students, which hosts this blog.

Despite advice from some education experts who have encouraged simplification of schedules during coronavirus-induced distance learning, staff at Pace Brantley decided to stick with a structured day because they know it’s what works best for their students. Parents were encouraged at the outset to set up a workspace for their children dedicated to their virtual school day. Students start the morning by reciting the Pledge of Allegiance followed by the school pledge, promising to treat everyone with fairness, kindness and respect, just as they did when they were reporting to their 9-acre campus.

The first half of each 90-minute period includes live lessons on Zoom. Students spend the second half working independently or in small groups. They also get one-on-one access to their teachers if they have questions.

One of those parents is Ann Zanca, whose son, Ben, attends Pace Brantley on a Gardiner Scholarship. Born with CLOVES Syndrome, a rare disorder characterized by tissue overgrowth and complex vascular anomalies, he is susceptible to respiratory issues, which puts him at higher risk for Covid-19 complications.

“When they started shutting down the school, part of me, as the mom of a kid at risk, was happy,” Zanca said.

She reports that Ben hasn’t missed a beat since the transition, which is critical if the 17-year-old is to stay on his college prep track.

“He needs to have a reason to get up and take a shower in the morning,” Zanca said, adding that she’s been impressed with how quickly the school responded to delivering distance learning.

“They put a lot of thought into it and made it as much like school as possible,” she said. “I listen at his door, and he’s engaging, and he’s laughing and doing his work.”

Another Pace Brantley parent, Susan Sleboda, said the experience has been similar for her son, Ryan. The 18-year-old senior is class president and a lead anchor and editor on the school’s morning news show.

“They’ve done a stellar job at providing this online format where students are actually able to interact with their teachers,” Sleboda said.

She was unsure at first how Ryan, who is on the autism spectrum and didn’t speak until he was 7, would acclimate to the change. Sleboda said he has adapted well and was eager to work with his peers to produce a virtual news program.

“By Day 2, he was telling a student that he was filming in an area where he had too much light,” she said. “Every day I’ve seen him gaining confidence in the system.”

Ryan, who plans to study anthrozoology at Beacon College in Leesburg next year, said he and his classmates are making the best of the situation, finding it not that much different from how things operated at their brick-and-mortar school. Instead of showing a lesson on the white board, his teachers are sharing their screens. Instead of producing a scene from “The Little Mermaid” for a live production of the school’s Broadway Dinner Night, the crew will pivot to a virtual production.

“It feels really weird, but I’m going to get used to it,” Ryan said.

If head of school Tapley had any doubts about her students’ ability to rise to the occasion, those doubts disappeared this week.

She learned, via parent emails, that some of the students are getting up and putting on their school uniforms before taking their places at their online workstations.